THE SPUR OF INDUSTRY

Evening Post, Volume CXXXII, Issue 104, 29 October 1941, Page 6

THE SPUR OF INDUSTRY

There can be nothing more harmful for industry than that the power to make decisions should be vested in one man —or in a few men —:no matter how able the few may be. While single "captains of industry" have at times been responsible for great achievements, the greatest progress of the last hundred years has been the product of widespread initiative and enterprise. It is the ■perception of this fact that leads to doubts regarding the efficacy of centralised control. The annual report of the Wellington Builders' and Contractors' Industrial Union of Employers expressed such doubts in referring to systems of control as deterrents of production and enterprise. The great value of the private ownership of industry is that it places responsibility, not upon one man or a small group, but upon great numbers. There is a spur to initiative. The thinking and planning are not done by a few, but by j the many. The building industry | affords a good illustration of this ! system and its results. Those who have succeeded in it owe their success to their enterprise. Instead of being content to work under direcI tions, they have sought scope for their own capacity to plan and direct. Their reward has been in accordance with their proved ability. The community has gained by their enterprise, and it is to the community's benefit that such enterprise should be encouraged, not smothered 7 by a system that prbduces a few all-powerful controllers and a great mass who work to orders.